Delivery Director

Job level: 13
Working Style: Hybrid, the successful candidate will be expected to attend an office on average twice a week based on client demand  in London or Bristol.

The Delivery Director is accountable for the delivery operating environment, quality and project execution health of manifesto. This is a senior leadership role created as manifesto grows in scale and complexity, the business requires a senior leader responsible for the delivery performance, operational consistency and client outcomes across the entire agency portfolio.  

The role sits at the centre of the agency delivery system, connecting  Commercial, Growth, Strategy, Technology, Design and Delivery into a coherent execution model. The Delivery Director is accountable for the environment through which work moves from sale into execution and into outcomes, ensuring programmes, projects, CI and support are properly governed, commercially controlled and delivered in a way that sustains client confidence and long-term relationships.

The role spans significant portfolio  breadth, delivery governance and mobilisation, capacity and project workforce alignment, commercial performance against forecast/budget, revenue recognition, risk containment and escalation management. It requires real-time visibility across the health of the agency's entire delivery portfolio and the authority, judgement and presence to act decisively when performance is under pressure.

This role carries accountability for outcomes, not oversight of activity. The Delivery Director is not a layer of governance above delivery. They are the operational leader who removes friction, resolves ambiguity, holds standards and ensures the agency can deliver with consistency and pace at the scale the business demands now and the greater scale it is moving towards. Empowering and working with the senior leaders within the Project Management capability to deliver maximum impact for their portfolios, clients and team. 

The Delivery Director provides leadership and intervention where delivery performance, client confidence and commercial outcomes require improvement.

Manifesto is evolving towards a more integrated, strategically-led and operationally mature Ai enabled agency model. As scale increases, so do the tensions inherent in that growth: increasing delivery and commercial complexity, higher coordination overhead across multidisciplinary teams, pressure on margin and forecasting confidence, evolving client expectations and the growing importance of scalable delivery systems.

The Delivery Director exists to create delivery transparency  and consistency in delivery across this environment. The role works in close partnership with the MD on maintaining delivery performance; Strategy Enablement and Partnerships Director, Strategy team, Head of PMO and Programme Leads on shaping viable, deliverable programmes; the Finance and Commercial Director on delivery  execution within commercial frameworks; Technology and Design leadership on quality and capability maturity; and Growth and client services leadership on sales-to-delivery mobilisation, estimation and feasibility.  The Delivery Director also works closely with the Engineering  Director, who holds delegated ownership for engineering leadership, capability, technical standards and team management.

The effectiveness of this role depends on the quality of these relationships and the clarity of accountability boundaries between growth, client leadership, operational execution and commercial governance.

Responsibilities

The Delivery Director owns delivery as a business capability. The role is accountable for orchestrating the flow of work through the business from point of sale, with full ownership of the following:

• Delivery execution, governance and operational health across portfolios 
• Sales-to-delivery mobilisation and delivery lifecycle management
• Delivery execution against agreed commercial budgets and operational plans
• Effective deployment of delivery capability against client requirement including management of near shore agreements
• Project and programme profitability/performance against agreed commercial parameters
• Supporting accurate forecasting and revenue reporting through on time and on budget delivery performance
• Client satisfaction and long-term retention through delivery excellence
• Risk containment, escalation management and delivery recovery
• Leadership, coaching and support for the project and programme management leaders and team 
• Delivery standards, maturity and continuous improvement ensuring AI, automations and process improvements are implemented effectively 

Commercial Accountability

The Delivery Director carries direct commercial accountability for project and programme delivery performance. The role owns revenue performance and recognition against budget and forecast, and is accountable for ensuring projects and programmes can be and are delivered in a commercially sustainable way with senior project and programme management leaders that aligns with agreed margin assumptions.

This encompasses project and programme profitability, delivery margin management, scope containment, operational forecasting accuracy and the early surfacing of margin leakage, delivery risk and forecasting issues.

The Delivery Director works in close partnership with the Finance and Commercial Director, who owns financial reporting integrity, pricing governance, systems architecture, commercial MI, margin analysis frameworks and forecasting governance. The Finance and Commercial Director governs the commercial operating framework; the Delivery Director is accountable for operational execution and performance within it. This distinction is deliberate and essential to maintaining clear ownership boundaries while enabling close operational collaboration.

Delivery Performance and Client Confidence

The Delivery Director is accountable for client confidence across delivery, not simply project completion. The operational environment must consistently produce work that clients trust, value and want to continue investing in.

• Delivery quality is consistent and reliable across all programmes
• Communication is proactive and transparent at every stage
• Risks are surfaced early and managed with rigour
• The delivery experience reflects the strategic ambition of the work
• Teams operate with clear accountability and ownership
• Projects convert into long-term relationships, retained revenue and reputation growth

Delivery quality directly drives client retention, account growth, referrals and commercial sustainability. Operational excellence is a strategic growth driver. This role also owns containment: in pressured environments, the Delivery Director creates clarity, pace and decision-making discipline. Ambiguity, escalation drift and delivery instability stop here.

Workforce, Capacity and Delivery Leadership

The Delivery Director owns the operational alignment between demand and delivery capability. This extends beyond resource allocation to encompass future project  capacity planning, delivery resilience, utilisation health,  project and programme  management succession risk and planning.

The role is accountable for ensuring the agency has the following:

• The right people aligned to the right work at the right time
• Gaps in skills and capabilities needed for project and programme delivery is identified with the Project and Programme Leadership team 
• Sufficient operational capacity to deliver the portfolio sustainably
• Strong delivery leadership within programmes and projects 
• Healthy escalation and decision-making structures
• Operational clarity across multidisciplinary teams
• The role operates within the capacity planning, utilisation frameworks and reporting structures governed by the Finance and Commercial Director. As the PSA implementation matures, operational resourcing and digital production responsibilities could  evolve further into the Delivery Director function.

Delivery Maturity and Operational Evolution

The Delivery Director is responsible for continuously improving delivery practices, governance, embedding operational standards, sharpening escalation clarity, developing project and programme  leadership capability and progression.  The goal is an agency that delivers at pace  without losing quality, predictability or commercial discipline. The Delivery Director is responsible for supporting the agency and the project and programme management team  in getting it there and keeping it there.

Leadership Expectations

This role is not a functional delivery lead. This is a senior leadership role operating across the agency and working closely with Executive Leadership.  The Delivery Director must be equally at home with c-suite clients as in the operational detail of complex programmes.

This requires someone who holds live operational detail and strategic context simultaneously, balances client satisfaction with commercial sustainability and maintains pace without sacrificing quality. They build trust across disciplines, challenge constructively at peer level and make sound decisions in complex, ambiguous environments without creating dependency.

Operational judgement, emotional intelligence and organisational credibility are prerequisites, not differentiators.

This role is a new investment for manifesto, and the successful candidate the opportunity to shape the role and value for the business but most importantly our clients. 

Professional experience and knowledge

 The successful candidate will bring significant senior leadership experience from a digital agency or equivalent, with a proven track record of leading multidisciplinary delivery organisations and creating the conditions for sustainable growth, strong client outcomes and commercial performance.

 Essential skills

• Senior delivery, programme, project or client services leadership within a digital agency or equivalent environment within a similar scale of manifesto. 
• A track record of leading delivery, programme management or operational functions within complex client-facing organisations and multiple sectors 
• Experience managing project and delivery teams at scale across multiple concurrent client engagements and sectors 
• Demonstrable success building and improving delivery operating models, governance structures and organisational processes
• Direct commercial accountability for project and portfolio profitability, forecasting, delivery margin and operational financial management 
• Experience leading operational change and delivery transformation
• Confidence and experience managing executive-level clients and senior stakeholders in complex delivery environments
• A background in digital delivery environments spanning strategy, design, engineering, data and client leadership
• Experience with PSA or resource management system implementation, scaled agency environments or AI-enabled delivery models would be an advantage.

Technical skills

• Digital programme, portfolio and delivery management
• Delivery governance and operational performance management
• Commercial management, including forecasting, revenue recognition, margin and profitability management
• Resource planning, capacity management and workforce utilisation
• Risk, issue and escalation management
• Sales-to-delivery mobilisation and programme planning
• Project and portfolio financial controls and reporting
• Delivery operating model design and continuous improvement
• PSA (Professional Services Automation) and resource management systems (desirable)
• Software development lifecycle (SDLC) and digital product delivery
• Agile, hybrid and scaled delivery methodologies
• Stakeholder and client management at executive level
• Data-driven performance analysis and management reporting
• Nearshore and third-party supplier management
• Change management and operational transformation
• Understanding of strategy, design, engineering and data delivery disciplines
• Experience with AI-enabled delivery models and automation tools (desirable)

PACT values

• Purpose - The beating heart of our organisation—the impact we make on people, places, and the planet. Purpose is our driving force and at the core of our organisation.
• Accountability - As we apply flexibility, pace and growth through our self-organisation, we are accountable* to all of our stakeholders.
• Craft - Craft highlights our dedication to bringing precision, problem-solving, and creativity to our work, both with our clients and internally.
• Togetherness - Togetherness is ‘how’ we work - it captures the energy, fun, and user-centred approach that we embrace. It signifies the collaborative spirit we bring to our work, including people at every level and creating a sense of belonging to our teams

manifesto

We are the digital experience agency for changemakers. We are committed to delivering purposeful and positive  impact for people, planet and society, in restless pursuit of a better world.

We take pride in creating award-winning digital experiences, products and services that are measurably ethical,  inclusive, accessible, sustainable and joyful. 

Our changemaker clients include UNICEF UK, Breast Cancer Now, The Trussell Trust, Woodgreen, The Royal Academy of Arts, Zoological Society London, Historic Environment Scotland and Fauna & Flora.

Part of the TPXimpact group - a Certified B Corporation™, we are a team of 130 digital product leaders, creative designers, user experience designers, engagement specialists, software engineers and experience strategists.

TPXimpact

TPXimpact is a digital transformation company, and Certified B Corporation™, on a mission to build a future where people, places and the planet are supported to thrive. Combining vast expertise in human-centred design, data, experience and technology, we help the public, private and third sectors with their digital transformation journey, delivering high quality solutions that improve services, experiences and outcomes. We’re passionate people who work in close collaboration with our clients to create sustainable solutions ready for an ever-evolving world.